Week One Exploring Countries and Cultures in My Father's World

We had a great first week of school. We went a little light on the three R's and will hit those a little harder next week. I wanted the girls to enjoy their first week back so we focused on the fun stuff. We did still do math, spelling, handwriting, reading, etc...just not in heavy doses and a lot of it was review.

We started our week last Sunday night with the first Bible lesson. We talked about how God made and loves ALL people all over the world. And we began learning John 3:16 (which was new to Mary Evelyn but review for Rachel). On Monday morning we prayed together and went on a prayer walk around our neighborhood. I wanted the girls to see that God loves the people all over the world AND right next door too! Plus I learned from our experience with occupational therapy that some kids learn better after some physical activity. (We always start Mary Evelyn's math lesson by counting to 100 while she swings as high as she can on the swingset!)

Our curriculum is My Father's World and we are doing year one in their five year History cycle. It is called Exploring Countries and Cultures. It is a year long geography course which serves as a great basis for learning history in the coming years as well as giving children and parents an appetite for world missions. (Those of you at North Hills know this goes perfectly with our summer World View curriculum for kids...so cool!)

These first two weeks are an introduction. We are learning about maps in general as well as learning the names of the continents and oceans. We talked about hemispheres, the poles, directions, and the equator. The cool part is that both girls memorized the names of the continents (thanks to a catchy little tune!) and can locate them on the map!

One of our fun activities was making the poster pictured above. Rachel wrote John 3:16 out for us and the girls cut out pictures of people from National Geographic magazines. They also put a small picture of our family on there. This poster will be displayed above our world map in the school room for the whole year...it's the theme of the year.

The girls also enjoyed our science this week. Probably because they got to draw, one of their absolute favorite things to do! Three days this week, I read them a couple of pages from the Usborne Living World Encyclopedia. Then they got to illustrate something they learned and write some sentences about it. I have heard some complain that there are not enough science experiments in Exploring Countries and Cultures, but I was never great at that anyway so this is just the right pace for us. There are SOME experiments (we have one or two next week actually) and the geography is very hands on, so we are happy as can be. With all of that and science at our TWO co-ops, I think drawing is just perfect...and about all I can handle! Their science drawings get filed into the science section of their notebooks. We'll also have a nature journal, which we will work on weekly.

This is Mary Evelyn's picture of a gecko from one of the science lessons. She dictated her sentences to me.

A world map that Rachel labeled with the oceans and continents. We'll add to it next week.

There was more but those are the highlights. I joined the My Father's World blogring so I will try my best to blog about our school year. If you prayed for us last week, THANK YOU! I was a little anxious, but it went so well.

Stay tuned this weekend for updated pictures of Betsie and the haircut that takes your breath away!